Earlier this year the company launched its first market onslaught with a new Twin Cab model featuring a coil spring rear suspension design, a first for Navara as Nissan moves to snare buyers in the lucrative leisure market.

Yesterday it was the turn of the leaf-sprung ‘‘workhorse’’ models to bask in the spotlight with Nissan Australia staff unveiling a staggering array of Single Cab, King Cab (one-and-a-half cab style with fold away rear jump seats) and Dual Cab vehicles with an array of petrol and diesel engines, manual and automatic transmissions, 4x2 and 4x4 drive configurations and tray and cab-chassis layouts.

Nissan added another 13 model variants to the Navara family which, combined with  the Dual Cab pick-up variants launched in June, brings the full local model range to 27 with 11 4x2 and 16 4x4 variants ranging across a price list starting at  $19,490 and peaking at $51,990 (not including on-road costs).

The leaf-sprung range, long seen as the darling of primary producers, miners and tradespeople because of its simplicity, robustness and extra carrying capacity, gets an additional model compared to the coil-sprung range with a Dual Cab, four-wheel-drive cab-chassis which can be fitted with a drop-side tray body and capable of managing a 1150 kilogram maximum payload capacity.

Describing the leaf-sprung Navaras as ‘‘the workhorse members of the Navara family compared to the coil-sprung variants’’, Nissan Australia managing director Richard Emery said the 27 model variants now available for Australia make this current range the biggest the company had ever offered and the wait for the new leaf-spring model an interesting one.

‘‘We have had buyers coming into dealerships to look at the coil-sprung Navara but who have chosen to wait until the leaf-spring variant is here so they can do side-by-side comparisons,’’ Mr Emery added.